Surging for a top 5 spot?
The Notre Dame Fighting Irish did everything they were supposed to do last week despite fan complaints that the 35-14 win over the Virginia Cavaliers wasn’t impressive enough. That, of course, was nonsense. Although the Irish didn’t cover the 22.5 point spread, they dominated Virginia and was never in much danger of it ever being a competitive game. That’s called “game control” brother — and the Irish had it.
So that was good.
So how did the Irish opponents do this week?
#15 Texas A&M Aggies — WON vs New Mexico State (8-2) —
Northern Illinois — WON vs Akron Zips (6-4) —
Purdue Boilermakers — LOST vs Penn State Nittany Lions (1-9) —
Miami Redhawks — WON vs Kent State Golden Flashes (6-4) —
#22 Louisville Cardinals — LOST vs Stanford Cardinal (6-4) —
Stanford Cardinal — WON vs Stanford Cardinal (3-7) —
Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets — BYE (6-4) —
Navy Midshipmen — LOST vs Tulane Green Wave (7-3) —
Florida State Seminoles — BYE (1-9) —
Virginia Cavaliers — LOST vs Notre Dame (5-5) —
#16 Army Black Knights — BYE (9-0) —
USC Trojans — WON vs Nebraska Cornhuskers (5-5) —
Notre Dame rose two spots in the AP Top 25 this week as we saw a couple of top ten losses. The Georgia Bulldogs took down the Tennessee Volunteers and the Kansas Jayhawks beat the BYU Cougars.
Obviously, the playoff rankings are what’s important here — but I will always remind people that the committee doesn’t give post playoff rankings. Those bulletpoints of “top 5” or “top 10” finishes come from the AP.
